Malaysia ranked fourth happiest country in Asia

Kuala Lumpur – Malaysian now has been ranked as the fourth happiest country in Asia, and 42nd happiest country among 155 nations in the world.

According to the 2017 World Happiness Report, Malaysia went up five places from last year’s report, whereby it was placed in 47th position.

However, Singapore which ranked as the happiest country in Asia fell from from 22nd place to 26th in this year’s overall report.

Countries that managed to climb up the ranks were Thailand (moved from 33rd to 32nd), Taiwan (from 42nd to 33rd) and Vietnam (from 96th to 94th).

This year, Norway grabbed the title of the World Happiest Country from Denmark, which fell to second place, followed by Iceland and Switzerland.

The report released on Monday by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network for the United Nations was based on several factors including economic strength (measured in Gross Domestic Product per capita), social support, life expectancy, freedom of choice, generosity, and perceived corruption.

Countries are ranked using three-year averages of data collected with the latest report covering 2014-2016, with some 3,000 respondents from each country asked to rate their life evaluations. – Bernama